11 Awful Opening Scenes In Otherwise Awesome Movies

8. The Russian Package - Cast Away

The Movie: Robert Zemeckis' daring survival drama gives Tom Hanks space to deliver one of his all-time best performances, and despite its arguably excessive run-time, it's a hopeful, occasionally hilarious and achingly human drama with the sort of ambition Hollywood's in short supply of these days.

The Scene: The film opens with a Fed-Ex truck pulling up to the "Dick & Bettina" ranch, where the driver collects a package for Bettina, which is then shown arriving in Russia, where her husband is staying. He signs for the package as it's revealed that he has a Russian mistress living with him, while the truck drives on to a cafe, where another package is delivered to a young boy, Nikolai, who takes it to the Fed-Ex depot where Chuck Noland (Tom Hanks) is working.

Why It Sucks: It's a very long-winded way to introduce audiences to Hanks' character, and though it has the obvious parallel with the movie's ending, where Bettina is now divorced after presumably finding out about her husband's infidelity (noted by the "Dick" being removed from her ranch's sign), again there's just no need for it. Why not just have Bettina be a single woman running a ranch who Noland needs to deliver the life-saving package to at the end? The implied romantic sentiment is basically the same but without an extra five minutes piled on top of the already wildly overlong 143 minute run-time.